THE PRINCESS ALEXANDRA
At the time of her marriage
KING EDWARD AS PRINCE OF WALES IN 1879
MARRIAGE OF EDWARD AND ALEXANDRA, THEN PRINCE AND PRINCESS OF WALES, 1863
From a painting at Windsor by W. P. Firth R.A.
CHAPTER I.
The Crown and the Empire
The great development of a political nature in the British Empire of the nineteenth century was the complete harmony which gradually evolved between the Monarchy and a world-wide democracy. This process was all-important because it eliminated an element of internal discord which has destroyed more than one nation in the past; because it permitted the peaceful progress of scattered states to continue through the passing years without having questions of allegiance to seriously hamper their growth; because it trained political thought along lines of stability and continuity and made loyalty and liberty consistent and almost synonymous terms; because it made the Crown the central symbol of the Empire's unity, the visible object of a world-wide allegiance, the special token of a common aspiration and a common sentiment amongst many millions of English-speaking people—the subject of untutored reverence and unquestioned respect amongst hundreds of millions of other races.